Rustic Wedding Cake Trio

"Charlotte Cake". Cheesecake topped w. fresh berries and wrapped in Lady Fingers.

10", 8" & 6" tiers.

My wonderful, handsome hubby built me my cake stand and even stopped by my cake supply store to get my supplies! Thank you, honey for eating hotdogs and pizza for dinner for the past 3 nights! ;)

Chocolate Fudge cake w. Rassberry filling and Amaretto Buttercream. Garnished w. white chocolate 'Petals'.

4-layer 10" and 2-layer 7" tiers.

Red Velvet w. Cream Cheese Buttercream. Garnished w. fresh berries and red Gumpaste Leaves.
8", 6" and 4" tiers

Gumpaste Flower Tutorial

As promised in the "Soft Vintage Pink and White 1st Birthday Party" post, here is your

Gumpaste Tutorial:

{Here are a couple of other examples of other cakes that I have done using this fabulous flower.}

Gumpaste Tutorial:

Here's what you need:

1.A set of round cutters (close-up shown below) {or you can find concentric circular shapes around your house and use those as a template, cutting them out with an Exacto knife} 2.Cornstarch 3.Wilton Ready-to-Use Gumpaste {or mix} 4. 2 sizes of silver, metallic Dragees - close-up also shown below. (For the smaller size, I used the tiniest dragges that I could find!) 5.Wilton Piping Gel 6.Small rolling pin (again, from Wilton) 7.Tweezers 8.A fondant and gumpaste ball tool (2 are shown but you only need 1) 9. Thin foam pad (Wilton) 10.Wilton Practice board OR a ziploc baggie. 11. Small parchment paper bag filled with the said Piping gel. ;) Tutorial here {In the video, she cuts her triangle in half. I make mine even smaller by cutting it in half AGAIN to have more control of the bag}. *Food coloring is optional depending on what color you want your flowers. You just add it to your gumpaste and kneed it before beginning. ;)

To Begin:

*Select the size cutters that you want. {I used every other size in my set and you can make this flower with as many layers as you want!!}

*Get a boulder-sized {'boulder' as in way back in the day of playing marbles} ball of gumpaste.

*With a super-thin coat of cornstarch on your mat (or surface; you really don't need the mat) and rolling pin, roll out your gumpaste as THIN as you can get it. I'm talking, PAPER THIN.

* Cut out your circles and place them under the practice board (or ziploc baggie) to keep them from drying out.

*Kneed the excess gumpaste and place it back in it's original bag.

*Place the largest circle on your thin foam pad and place your ball tool half-way onto the foam and half-way onto the gumpaste.

*Make sure you have a thin layer of cornstarch on your ball tool and with a fluid motion, rub tool around your gumpaste's edge to create the ruffled edge.

*As you finish each circle, use your piping bag to adhere each circle to the next.

*To make the Dragge center, place a (very small) pea-sized drop of piping gel in the center of your smallest flower.

*With your tweezers, place a large dragge in the center of the piping gel drop.

* Through trial and error, I have found that the easiest way to place the teeny-tiny dragess in place is to pour a few around the center dragee...

*...then sort them with your tweezers.

*Let the flower dry at least 8 hours before assembling them on the cake {or cupcake! They make SUPER cute cupcake toppers!}.

Happy baking, everyone!

Soft Vintage Pink and White 1st Birthday Party

We had a WONDERFUL time! We ate lots of cake..

{To see the Birthday Girl's 1st Birthday photo shoot, complete with smash cake, go here.}

...and Cupcakes... ...We sang Happy Songs... ...opened lots of fun presents... ...played with our friends...



...had some belly laughs...

... and read pretty books. {Just LOOK at that little pointer finger!}

The Dessert Table.

I really wanted to do an "Amy Atlas" inspired dessert table. {http://amyatlas.com/ PLEASE don't compare my work to hers. She is AMAZING.) I just LOVE her work! While I am not a fan of contemporary design, I love her clean, symetrical, repetitive lines. She does a wonderful job of softening her contemporary lines and making a theme look fantastic. I went for a very soft, very feminine, vintage style with a tiny modern twist on it in a pallate of pinks, whites and creams.

Most of this wonderful serving-ware is from the thrift store! I think I REALLY lucked out that day and found some great pieces!

Great tissue Pom-pom tutorial from Martha Stewart here.

Party Favors {Ali's "kisses"}

These were strung on a White picture frame. Sorry for the lame picture. ;)

Cookies 'N Cream & Milk Chocolate Hershey Bars that read:

"Alice Rebecca, April 21st, One year filled with pure, SWEET joy."

FANTASTIC paper from Hobby Lobby. I cut the medalions with fancy scissors then took a stamp-pad to the edges.

Super cute marshmallows that I found at Wal-mart (of all places). They were really gross. But they were pretty. ;)


Meringues

{Recipie here. I just made mine fancy by piping them out of a piping bag with a fancy tip (Wilton 1M) }

Another Cake Stand made from Thrift-Store finds! 6 Layer Chocolate Fudge Cake
w. Whipped Ganache filling {Tutorial here. To make my life easier, I used Ghiradelli chocolate chips instead of chopping my own chocolate.} & Amaretto Swiss Meringue Buttercream {Tutorial here.}I followed this buttercream ruffle tutorial: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHYX0qXDVy0

My Gumpaste Flower tutorial here.

This Cake Stand was made from two FABULOUS pieces that I found at the Thrift Store!! I think it cost me a total of $2.75.

White Rassberry cupcakes w. edible feathers and "pearls"

{White cake (Box mix!!)w. Rassberry filling {from Orson Gygi's} and Fresh Rassberry American Buttercream

*The 'Pearls' were made by rolling white fondant in a ball, then rolling it around in 'Pearl dust' from Wilton. The 'Feathers' were actually made from rice paper! I found the rice paper at my favorite local kitchen supply store Orson Gygi's. I just cut it into the shape of a feather, then took my scissors and made the slits on the sides.
This Cupcake Stand was made from placing two glass stands from Wal-mart. They were on sale and cost me $9.00 total!

Cupcake wrappers were made from {Grease-proof} paper doilies!! Tutorial here from Intimateweddings.com.

Beaded Chandelier tutorial here from Dollar Store Crafts!

For more peeks at the photos hanging here, click here. Beverage dispenser: $6.00 from Wal-mart! Carrot Cake Cake Pops
Tutorial from Bakerell here.
My hubby from Tomseth Construction made this Barnwood flooring that I used as a photo prop in Ali's 1-year Photo Shoot. It was AMAZING in the photos. I ran to Hobby Lobby and grabbed 4.5 yards of their ruffled material from the spool [instead of making it myslef] and it saved me SO much time.

This lovely cream and sugar set were also a thrift-store find!

{Pssst, here's a secret. I made this Pink Lemonade (Crystal Light!) look extra fancy by adding the lemon slices!}

The nametags just added that extra fancy, put-together touch. ;)

The "Guess how old I am" game. You had to guess which month of her life each of these pics were taken in. Super hard! Lemme tell ya!

We had some wonderful family and friends come up! My brother, Scott and his awesome family came all the way from Payson. Our good friend, Mark ('Uncle Mark' to my kids) drove up from Saratoga Springs, my good friend, Sara and her kidlets came. GUESS WHO else came?!! My In-Laws!! It was such a {WONDERFUL} suprise! They came all the way from Cali JUST for Ali's 1st birthday!! What amazing parents and grandparents. I am so lucky to have them as family. ;) We had a great time eating, talking, laughing, eating and playing.

*A BIG 'Thank-You" to the lovely Jen from Tatertotsandjello.blogspot.com for the wonderful Mother's Day spotlight!*